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Prospection (Gilbert & Wilson, 2007), the representation of possible futures, is a ubiquitous feature of the human mind. Much psychological theory and practice, in contrast, has understood human action as determined by the past and viewed any such teleology (selection of action in light of goals) as a violation of natural law because the future cannot act on the present. Prospection involves no backward causation; rather, it is guidance not by the future itself but by present, evaluative representations of possible future states. These representations can be understood minimally as "If X, then Y" conditionals, and the process of prospection can be understood as the generation and evaluation of these conditionals. We review the history of the attempt to cast teleology out of science, culminating in the failures of behaviorism and psychoanalysis to account adequately for action without teleology. A wide range of evidence suggests that prospection is a central organizing feature of perception, cognition, affect, memory, motivation, and action. The authors speculate that prospection casts new light on why subjectivity is part of consciousness, what is "free" and "willing" in "free will," and on mental disorders and their treatment. Viewing behavior as driven by the past was a powerful framework that helped create scientific psychology, but accumulating evidence in a wide range of areas of research suggests a shift in framework, in which navigation into the future is seen as a core organizing principle of animal and human behavior.

IntroductionPosttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a debilitating psychiatric disorder characterized by symptoms of re-experiencing, hyperarousal, emotional numbing and avoidance; 1 however, exact brain mechanisms involved in the generation of PTSD symptoms or in PTSD pathophysiology have yet to be elucidated. Converging neuroimaging research points to a potentially critical role for disrupted emotion neurocircuitry in individuals with PTSD, and whereas many studies have delineated patterns of activations during face viewing or symptom provocation (for a review, see Shin and Liberzon 2 ), relatively few have examined patterns of connectivity in the brains of patients with PTSD at rest, a potentially powerful method for illuminating brain network structure. 3,4 Most PTSD neuroimaging studies to date have described abnormalities in emotion-generation regions, such as the amygdala or insula, and emotion-regulation regions, including the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) and medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC). This is consistent with the known role of the amygdala as a key region in threat detection, 5 fear conditioning 6 and emotional salience, 7 and of the mPFC as a modulatory region interconnected with limbic structures 8 and involved in emotion regulation.9 Taken together, functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies of individuals with PTSD suggest patterns of hyperactivation of the amygdala and insula to emotion-related stimuli and corresponding hypoactivation of ventromedial prefrontal and rostral anterior cingulate cortices.2 This pattern of amygdala hyperactivity and mPFC hypoactivity was recently confirmed by a meta-analysis of 15 PTSD neuroimaging studies 10 and is generally understood to reflect a lack of regulatory control over emotion in individuals with PTSD.Studies of functional connectivity, however, can provide additional and potentially more direct information about regu latory relationships between the mPFC and amygdala. The amygdala has tight structural connections and reciprocal feedback loops with the mPFC and orbitofrontal cortex 11 as well as with the dorsolateral PFC 12 and ACC. 13 As amygdala Background: Converging neuroimaging research suggests altered emotion neurocircuitry in individuals with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Emotion activation studies in these individuals have shown hyperactivation in emotion-related regions, including the amygdala and insula, and hypoactivation in emotion-regulation regions, including the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) and anterior cingulate cortex (ACC). However, few studies have examined patterns of connectivity at rest in individuals with PTSD, a potentially powerful method for illuminating brain network structure. Methods: Using the amygdala as a seed region, we measured resting-state brain connectivity using 3 T functional magnetic resonance imaging in returning male veterans with PTSD and combat controls without PTSD. Results: Fifteen veterans with PTSD and 14 combat controls enrolled in our study. Compared with controls, veterans with ...

a b s t r a c tIn this paper, we present the results of the construction and validation of a new psychometric tool for measuring beliefs about free will and related concepts: The Free Will Inventory (FWI). In its final form, FWI is a 29-item instrument with two parts. Part 1 consists of three 5-item subscales designed to measure strength of belief in free will, determinism, and dualism. Part 2 consists of a series of fourteen statements designed to further explore the complex network of people's associated beliefs and attitudes about free will, determinism, choice, the soul, predictability, responsibility, and punishment. Having presented the construction and validation of FWI, we discuss several ways that it could be used in future research, highlight some as yet unanswered questions that are ripe for interdisciplinary investigation, and encourage researchers to join us in our efforts to answer these questions.

Objective Convergent neuroimaging and neuropsychological research demonstrates disrupted attention and heightened threat sensitivity in PTSD. This might be linked to aberrations in large-scale networks subserving detection of salient stimuli, i.e. the salience network (SN), and stimulus-independent, internally-focused thought, i.e. the default mode network (DMN). Methods Resting state brain activity was measured in returning veterans who served in Iraq or Afghanistan with (n=15) and without PTSD (n=15) and in healthy community controls (n=15). Correlation coefficients were calculated between the time course of seed regions in key SN and DMN regions (posterior cingulate, ventromedial prefrontal cortex, and bilateral anterior insula) and all other voxels of the brain. Results Compared to control groups, PTSD participants showed reduced functional connectivity within DMN (between DMN seeds and other DMN regions), including rostral ACC/vmPFC (Z=3.31; p=.005, corrected) and hippocampus (Z=2.58; p=.005), and increased connectivity within SN (between insula seeds and other SN regions), including amygdala (Z=3.03; p=.01, corrected). PTSD participants also demonstrated increased cross-network connectivity. DMN seeds exhibited elevated connectivity with SN regions, including insula (Z=3.06; p=.03, corrected), putamen, and supplementary motor area (Z=4.14; Z=4.08; p<.001), and SN seeds exhibited elevated connectivity with DMN regions, including hippocampus (Z=3.10; p=.048, corrected). Conclusions During resting state scanning, PTSD participants showed reduced coupling within DMN, greater coupling within SN, and increased coupling between DMN and SN. Our findings suggest a relative dominance of threat-sensitive circuitry in PTSD, even in task-free conditions. Disequilibrium between large-scale networks subserving salience detection versus internally focused thought may be associated with PTSD pathophysiology.

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